Topside

"Topside" is a shadow corporation that has been trying to corner the market and direction of genetic engineering.[1] It is apparently the parent company of the Dyad Institute, with a particular interest in Project Leda and yet also has ties with the military faction involved with research into the male clones, Project Castor.

Relationship with the Dyad Institute

The working relationship between the Dyad Institute and Topside is somewhat ambiguous. In Season 2 it was indicated that Topside were the superiors to the key players at the Dyad Institute, with one of their senior personnel, Marion Bowles, issuing instructions to both Dr. Aldous Leekie and Rachel Duncan.[2] She suggested but did not directly instruct Rachel to terminate Leekie.

However, in Season 3, Delphine Cormier, who had at that point taken over Rachel's position in the Dyad Institute, issued instructions to Ferdinand (another Topside operative) to "Abort Helsinki," indicating more of a partnership between the two companies rather than a hierarchy.

Topside Operations

Topside has been involved in a number of operations (some covert) involving both Projects Leda and Castor, sometimes in collaboration with the Dyad Institute.

Helsinki (2006) - described as an "incident" in the Scandinavian capital when six Project Leda clones had become self aware. Apparently in collaboration with the Dyad Institute, these six Helsinki girls were terminated, which also resulted in 32 collateral casualties.[3]

Capture of Project Castor Clone - Rudy, a male clone from Project Castor, was captured and imprisoned by Topside at Marion Bowles' residence after he and his clone brother Seth attempted to abduct Project Leda clone Krystal Goderich. In the process of being captured, he killed two Dyad operatives. He subsequently escaped with the aid of Seth.[3]

Codename "Helsinki" (2015) - an operation initiated by Rachel Duncan whilst still in a position of power at the Dyad Institute. The operation was intended to eliminate the self-aware clones that Dyad were aware of to avoid exposure of Topside. Sarah Manning, Cosima Niehaus, and Alison Hendrix were all on the hit list before Delphine became aware of the operation and instructed the abortion of the operation.[3]

Capture of the Project Leda and Castor original - Topside wished to capture Kendall Malone, the source material for the clones, in order to reproduce Ethan Duncan's cloning trials. However, at the intervention of Sarah and Delphine, it was agreed with Dyad that Topside was "the lesser of two evils," the other evil referring to the research conducted by the military into weaponizing the genetic defects in clones. A compromise was met by Dyad and Topside to eliminate Project Castor in exchange for the source material.[4]